`Art Of Sushi` On Videotape: Instruction Aid And An Inspiration

September 12, 1985|By Jay Pridmore.

Someday, we will cherish a videotape such as ``The Art of Sushi.``

In it, for almost two hours, a Japanese man in native garb and headband struggles with English, laughs, deftly butchers half a dozen fish, and goes back and forth unpredictably among mackeral, salmon, rice, wasabi and omelettes.

He cuts fish ``sushi-size,`` digresses to sashimi and later on to futo maki. He works hard, and by the end of the tape, he is getting weary.

It won`t be many years before a video sushi chef appears before us with a Japanese lilt to otherwise impeccable English. Such a future tape will be perfectly scripted, and instant replays will reinforce lessons of particularly difficult filleting techniques. The current one does not have those features, but for those who have the patience, there is plenty to learn from this tape. ``The Art of Sushi`` was recently released by Homespun Videos, Woodstock, N.Y., and one wonders if the name of the company was an afterthought because the final product is indeed homespun, even naive. People who take a quick look at the production, then at the $50 price tag might be put off. But if you have a fondness for sushi, sashimi and the whole personality of your local sushi bar, you might well like this tape.

Sushi is a mentality almost more than it is an ethnic dish. It requires an almost reverential attitude toward the freshness of the fish. It requires great patience, and it requires knowledge that can only be gained through long hours of repetition. ``Do not discourage (sic),`` says Shige Hara, the star of the tape. ``It takes practice.``

Butchering the fish, for example, may be an intimidating notion. Indeed, in Japan, the chef with the most experience is entrusted with the knives to cut the very finest morsels from very expensive fish. While Shige is not exactly lucid in describing how to slice the fishes` heads off and run the knife between rib and meat, the ease of his technique is inspiring.

Shige does provide some practical advice. When scaling the flounder, for example, he says to use short, quick strokes. When cutting through the dense meats of the tuna and salmon, use long, strong strokes.

``Be careful when you cut it so you do not tear the fish,`` he says.

Sharp knives are essential. So are bandages. Even the master appears on a scene midway through the tape with a bandaged finger.

Getting the bones out is a prosaic art; it reminds one of primitive surgery at one point when Shige is cutting through the ``stong bone`` of a sea bass.

But other parts of the butchery are more exquisite. In taking the skin off the mackeral fillet, he peels it with his fingers, making sure to remove only the top, transparent layer. ``Don`t destroy the nice design of the mackeral,`` he says, then stroking the silver and black striping with his finger.

While butchering may be tedious, gratification becomes more intense when the chef starts cutting the fish into sushi-size pieces. The tuna is carved off in quarter-inch pieces that positively glisten like marble. The white fishes, flounder and mackeral, are sliced at only half that thickness.

One of the more artful techniques is toward the tail, when the fillet is too thin for a uniform cut. The master leaves two slices attached slightly, and they unfold into a good size and shape to wrap comfortably around a rice ball.

``To be a master of sushi, it takes 10 years,`` Shige says. This means that there are plenty of tricks relating to timing and samurai-like knife control that the serious novice will only begin to learn.

Is the difficulty worth it? For Orientals it is because they sometimes say that there is a spiritual quality transmitted from fish to man.